Display hook structures



p 1 959 L. H. BEST 2,903,765 DISPLAY HOOK STRUCTURES Filed Dec. 1, 1954 I20 0 V v 9% Inventor 11.22012 if. fi'esi' .5 7am Mew flit-arr: e g8 United States Patent "ice DISPLAY HOOK STRUCTURES Leon H, Best, Galva, Ill., assignor to John H. Best & Sons, Inc., Galva, 111., a corporation of Illinois Application December 1, 1954, Serial No. 472,470

'2 Claims. (CI. 24-86) This application is a continuation in part of my copending application Serial No. 432,635, filed May 27, 1954, and now abandoned.

This invention relates to display hook structures, and particularly to such hook structures that are adapted for engagement with a fabric material such as rugs and the like to suspend such fabric material from a supporting rod or the like.

In the display of rugs in retail sales establishments, it is quite common practice to utilize relatively small samples or pieces of rug material for display purposes, and to effect economy of space and convenience of display, it is customary to hang these samples on horizontal support rods or brackets that form part of a display rack.

Because of the continued handling of the samples by sales people and customers, it is important that the hook structure be so related to the fabric of the rug that the sharp end or point of the rug-engaging hook be fully protected by the material of the rug, thus to avoid all possibility of injury of the persons who may be handling the samples. It is therefore an important object of the present invention to enable a display hook structure to be afforded where the pointed end of the material-engaging hook is elficiently protected, and wherein the pointed end is located in such a protected relationship as an incident to the operations that are necessary in the hanging of the sample on the supporting rack.

With rug samples and the like are supported from the brackets of a supporting rack, it is usually desirable to secure maximum display capacity through the hanging of two rug samples in a back-to-back relationship on each of the supporting brackets, and to enable this to be accomplished in a simple and expeditious manner is a further and related object of the present invention.

Other and further objects of the present invention will be apparent from the following description and claims and are illustrated in the accompanying drawing which, by way of illustration, show preferred embodiments of the present invention and the principles thereof and what I now consider to be the best mode in which I have contemplated applying these principles. Other embodiments of the inventions embodying the same or equivalent principles may be used and structural changes may be made as desired by those skilled in the art without departing from the present invention and the purview of the appended claims.

In the drawings Fig. 1 is a perspective view showing rug samples suspended from a rack through the use of one form of display hook structure embodying the invention;

Fig. 2 is an enlarged sectional view taken along the line 2-2 of Fig. 1;

Fig. 3 is a view similar to Fig. 2 and showing the manner in which a second rug sample is put in place on a track;

Fig. 4 is a plan view of the structure shown in Fig. 2;

Fig. 5 is a view showing the manner of insertion of the hook;

2,903,765 Patented Sept. 15, 1 959 110, and this hook unit is shown in detail in Figs. 8 and.

9. The hook unit is formed from relatively stiff wire to afford a straight shank 112 with a downwardly opening support-engaging hook 114 at its upper end and an upwardly opening material-engaging hook 116 at its lower end, and through the use of a plurality of the. hook units 110, a piece of fabric material such as a rug, sample RR may be suspended from a supporting means such as a supporting rod 118,

.Such a rod 118 may be one of several such rods afio-rded, for example, on a display rack 120 which is of a form adapted for wall mounting. The rack 120 has a pair of angle bars 121, 122 fastened thereto, and these are provided with spaced mounting openings into which bent ends of the arms 118 are inserted.

In the formation of the fabric-engaging lower hook 116, the wire material is bent to afford an arcuate, bight 116B which merges with an upwardly extending material piercing arm 116A, the end portion or which is tapered to form a sharp pointed end 116P.

The support-engaging hook 114 is formed, as will evident in Fig. 8 of the drawings, by affording an arcuate bight 11143 at the upper end of the shank, and this b ight 114B is extended in the form of a downwardly extending arm 114A that is located parallel to the shank 112 of the hook structure. The arm 114A extends downwardly for about two thirds of the length of the shank 112, and is substantially parallel to the axis of the shank 112.

The arm 114A has a special formation thereon to prevent interlocking or snagging of the hook 114 unto other hooks or with the rug samples, and this is afforded by bending the lower end of the arm 114A laterally in a generally arcuate bight 2148, and then upwardly as at 314, after which the end of the Wire is bent as at 414 to a point adjacent the arm 114A. The par-ts 114A, 214, 314 and 4141-ie in a plane disposed in a particular relation as will be described. The shank 112 and the arm 114A define a first plane in which the arcuate bight 1143 is, located.

As pointed out hereinabove, the shank 112 and the arm 114A define what may be termed a first plane, and for purposes of simplifying the description and definition of the novel features of the present device, it may be assumed that another or second plane passes through the shank 112 and is perpendicular to the aforesaid first plane. Then, with respect to the first and, second planes as thus defined, the location and form of the elements of the present hook structure may be more readily appreciatedand defined. Thus, the support-engaging hook 114 may be said to be disposed upon one side of such second plane, while the material-engaging hook 116 is. located entirely upon the other side of this second plane, Moreover, the arm 116A of the material-engaging hook; 116 is disposed so that the point 116P is located relatively close to the aforesaid second plane, as will be evident from a consideration particularly of Fig. 8 of the drawings. The arm 116A, however, is bent laterally with respect to the aforesaid first plane, as will be evident in Fig. 9 of the drawings, so as to extend upwardly and away from said first plane, and this locates the point 116P of the hook 116 in a substantial laterally spaced position with respect to such first plane, as shown in Fig. 9 of the drawings. This form and relationship of the hook 116 and the point 116P thereof with respect to the two aforesaid reference planes is of great advantage in the practical use of the hook structure of the present invention, as will be apparent from the following description of the mode of application and use of this hook structure.

.Thus, as shown in Fig. of the drawings, the hook structure or hook unit 110 is located in a special position or relation when it is desired to insert the point 1161 of the hook 116 into the fabric material. This position or relation may be defined by pointing out that the hook 114 is located in a plane parallel to the plane of the fabric, thus to locate the point 116P against the fabric as shown in Fig. 5. In respect to such location or positioning of the hook unit 110, it is important to note that the entry loop aiforded by the elements 214, 314, and 414 are disposed so as to extend away from said first plane in the direction opposite from the hook arm 116A, and this serves to dispose the loop in an out of the way relation when the material engaging operations are to be performed. The point 116P is shown in Fig. 5 as being located against the surface of the rug back with the arm 116A sloping away from the rug back, and by moving the hook structure upwardly as viewed in Fig. 5, the point 1161 and the entire arm 116A may be moved endwise with a piercing action into the fabric so that when such movement is completed, the hook 116 will be firmly engaged with the rug back. The hook structure is then rotated through substantially 90 about substantially the axis of the arm 116A, thus to locate the support-engaging hook 114 in a plane substantially perpendicular to the back surface of the fabric or rug RR, and it will be observed that such rotative movement is necessary in order to locate the support-engaging hook 114 in a proper relation for engagement with a support such as the rod 118. The elements 214, 314 and 414, cooperate with the aim 114A to form a looped entry end for the hook 114, and these elements lie in still a third plane that is parallel to but spaced from the aforesaid second plane. Two or more such hook units 110 may be put in position in the fabric such as the rug RR, and the fabric may then be mounted in suspended relation upon a bracket such as the rod 118. In accomplishing this, the looped end of the hook 114 simplifies the. mounting of the first rug RR on a particular bracket or rod 118.

As to the mounting of a second rug on the opposite side of a bracket such as a rod 118, particular attention is directed to Fig. 3 of the drawing where it will be evident that theupper end of the second rug RR is slightly bent so that the entry loop of the hook 114 will be located in position to engage the rod. The second rug RR may then be lowered slightly until the rod 118 has partially entered the space between the shank 112 and the loop, after which the second rug that is being hung may be manipulated to locate the shank 112 and the arm 114A in a substantially vertical position. The entry loop may then move down freely to its supporting position, and the smooth surfaces of the looped end assure that this may take place freely and without danger of catching the second book structure on the relatively rough back of the first or right-hand rugof Fig. 2.

It is of particular importance to observe that when a hook unit of the present invention is engaged with a fabric such as a rug in the manner hereinabove described, the rotation of the hook 14 or 11 into a plan'eperpendicular to the back of the back of the rug serves to force the point 16P or 116P into a protected relationship within the rug back, as will be evident particularly in the drawings, and hence the handling of the rugs by customers or salesmen may be performed without danger of injury by the sharp points 16F or 116P.

From the foregoing description, it will be apparent that the present invention affords a new and highly useful display hook unit that may safely be used in public or retail show rooms, and which is of such a character that the insertion of the hooks into the rug or other fabric material is simple and easy to accomplish, and the sharp point of the hook is invariably located in a safe or protected position. Moreover, hanging operations that are required in suspending the rugs from a rack may be performed readily and easily and without injury to the rug or other samples.

I Thus, while I have illustrated and described the preferred embodiment of my invention, it is to be understood that this is capable of variation and modification and I therefore do not wish to be limited to the precise details set forth, but desire to avail myself of such changes and alterations as fall within the purview of the following claims.

I claim:

1. In a display hook structure for suspending fabric and like material from a support, a substantially vertically straight shank having a downwardly facing support-engaging hook formed at its upper end to provide an arcuate bight, a downwardly extending portion connected to said bight, said downwardly extending portion and said shank defining a first plane and said support-engaging hook being disposed on one side of a second plane that passes through said shank and is perpendicular to said first plane, an upwardly facing ma terial-engaging hook formed at the lower end of said shank and terminating in a pointed end, said materialengaging hook being disposed on the other side of said second plane and in part in said first plane, said pointed end being disposed relatively close to said second plane and spaced laterally a substantial distance from said first plane in one direction, the end of said portion of said support-engaging hook being formed into an entry loop disposed in a third plane that is substantially parallel to said second plane and which includes said portion of said support-engaging hook, and said entry loop being positioned so as to extend from said first plane in a direction opposite to said one direction.

2. A display hook structure according to claim 1 wherein the free lower end of said entry loop lies closer to said shank than does said downwardly extending portion.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 823,317 Best June 12, 1906 991,694 Bryte May 9, 1911 1,475,306 McGhee Nov. 27, 1923 2,448,637 Swanson Sept. 7, 1948 2,592,922 Lucier Apr. 15, 1952 2,641,315 Martens June 9, 1953 FOREIGN PATENTS 11,533 Great Britain AD. 1894 21,765 Great Britain AD. 1892 

